William James in Focus

Willing to Believe

William J. Gavin

Publication Year: 2012

William James (1842-1910) is a canonical figure of American pragmatism. Trained as a medical doctor, James was more engaged by psychology and philosophy and wrote a foundational text, Pragmatism, for this characteristically American way of thinking. Distilling the main currents of James's thought, William J. Gavin focuses on "latent" and "manifest" ideas in James to disclose the notion of "will to believe," which courses through his work. For students who may be approaching James for the first time and for specialists who may not know James as deeply as they wish, Gavin provides a clear path to understanding James's philosophy even as he embraces James's complications and hesitations.

Cover

Title Page, Copyright, Dedication

Contents

Preface

Many thought that this kind of psychological subjectivism had no place in the
cold logical circles of philosophy, where one sought objectivity and, ultimately,
certainty. A strategy was undertaken to engage in some sort of “damage control,”
that is, to allow sentimental concerns in “soft” areas like morality, interpersonal
relationships, and religion, ...

Acknowledgments

For over four decades, I have had the opportunity to teach courses on American
philosophy and William James in particular at the University of Southern Maine.
I am most grateful for all the insights provided by USM students during this period
of time. ...

List of Abbreviations

1. James’s Life: Will to Believe as Affirmation

William James was born on January 11, 1842, in New York City, at the Astor
House.1 His father’s father made a great deal of money. Among other things, he
invested in the Erie Canal. At one time, he was reputed to be the second-richest
person in New York State, after John Jacob Astor. James’s father inherited a considerable
amount of this fortune; ...

2. “The Will to Believe”: Policing versus Free-Roaming

In 1879 and 1882, James published two parts of articles that collectively would
become known as “The Sentiment of Rationality.” It is remarkable how much
this early text anticipates his more mature and even his final positions in philosophy.
He begins by looking over various conceptualizations of the universe ...

3. The Principles of Psychology: Consciousness as a Constitutive Stream

The Principles of Psychology (PP) James’s first major work, was twelve years in the
making and earned for him the title “father of American psychology.” Initially,
James adopted a “functional dualism” for this text, separating the domain of psychology
from other domains, such as metaphysics: “Every natural science assumes
certain data critically. ...

4. The Varieties of Religious Experience: Mysticism as a Vague “Exemplar”

The very title The Varieties of Religious Experience gives us a clue to James’s intent.
The book itself is one long plea that religious experience is pervasive. Taking his
examples from all areas of organized religion, James again and again ostensively
makes this point—there is simply no ignoring the amount of “evidence” for religious
experience. ...

5. Pragmatism: Corridor as “Latent” and “The Will to Believe”

Like many of his other texts, James’s contains both a manifest
and a latent image. On the surface level, it is a “method only.” James describes it
as a corridor with various topics leading to different rooms by our asking “What
difference does it make?” if a given theory is true. It is a way of resolving issues
rather than dissolving them. ...

6. Metaphysics: Radical Empiricism and Pure Experience

As is well known, in The Principles of Psychology (PP) James adopted a functional
dualism, between psychology and philosophy, or thought and reality. However,
his description of consciousness as selective and intentional was a “nascent attack”
on the subject-object dichotomy. For several years after, James struggled with the
issue of how to reject this dualistic division. ...

7. “Pure” versus “Impure” Experience: Examples of Pure Experience

The question of the availability of pure experience leads directly to the issue of
language and to James’s ambivalence about language. The question of the availability
of pure experience also constitutes the latent content of Essays in Radical Empiricism
(ERE) and A Pluralistic Universe (PU). Let us take up the issue of language
first. ...

8. Challenges to “The Will to Believe”

Challenges to “The Will to Believe” come from two sides, the Right and the Left.
The “manifest” challenge comes from the Right and has traditionally been associated
with the critique of A. J. Ayer and other positivists. It suggests that James was
not as logically consistent as he should have been and that he should have been
clearer. ...

Conclusion: Pragmatism, Death, and “The Will to Believe”

As was seen in the previous chapters, the importance of the individual was a topic
central to James’s thought. This chapter will focus on how individuals comport
themselves at the end of life insofar as this can be gleaned from the text of Pragmatism
(Prag) itself. My analysis begins with an observation, perhaps with a detour
of sorts. ...

Epilogue

Questions remain. Did James really come to realize that a complete description of
reality or pure experience was not to be had?1 That the “problem of being” could
not be solved, so to speak? That one has to go on, knowing that there would be no
final answer? That closure not only did not come today but indeed would never
come and, hypothetically, even if it did come, we would reject it? ...

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